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MARIE CAHILL, when interviewed by Zoe 
Beckley for the Evening Mail, said “I found a 
wonderful book called ‘Eat and Grow Thin/ 
Why, it’s a regular young Bible! You don’t 
starve yourself, you just cut out certain sugars 
and starches. It melted me down from—let’s 
see, how much did I weigh—mmm—hum—er— 
well, from what I was six months ago to what 
I am now! . . . and when I get off three 
pounds more I shall be—just—scientifically 
correct” 






ca? 3 


EAT 

AND GROW THIN 

THE MAHDAH MENUS 


New edition, enlarged and revised, with 
additional recipes and the new salad- 
dressings. 

WITH A PREFACE BY 

VANCE THOMPSON 



NEW YORK 

E. P. DUTTON & COMPANY 

PUBLISHERS 
















T4- 

t ^ 2/4 


First impression March 1914. 

Tenth impression October 1915. 
Twentieth impression March, 1920. 
Twenty-fourth impression November, 1921. 
New edition with additions March, 1924. 


Copyright, 1914, 1924. 

By E. P. DUTTON & COMPANY 




0 i 




“Moneo, Domine, ut sis prudens ad victum. 






































. 


' 


























4 


• * 
















H 














* 










CONTENTS 


PAGE 

Preface . 

I The Tragedy of Fat. i 

II The Wrong Way.. . . 5 

III The Right Way ........ 11 

IV The Fat Man in Broadway.18 

V Rather Personal.22 

VI About the Book.29 

How to Eat and Grow Thin.33 

“Forbidden Food”.36 

Don’t.40 

The Laws of Diet.41 

Menus December, January, February ... 52 

March, April, May ......... 63 

June, July, August.71 

September, October, November.80 

Recipes.91 

Chutney Eggs.91 

Clam Cocktail.91 

Devilled Eggs in Pipkins.92 

Devilled Tongue .92 

Haddock in Pipkins.93 

Mahdah Appetizer.93 

Mahdah Mince.94 

Mince of Mushrooms.94 

Oyster Appetizer.95 

Oyster Cocktail.95 

Salmon in Pipkins . 95 

Savory Grill.96 

vii 


























Vlll 


CONTENTS 


PAGE 


CEufs Mollets.97 

Mussels Mariniere. 97 

Oysters (Steamed).99 

Barsch (Duck, Polish Style).ioo 

Dolmas. ioi 

Aspic Jelly.103 

Meat Jelly.104 

Mahdah Jellied Pie.104 

Chives.105 

Eggplant.105 

Green Vegetables.106 

Stuffed Tomatoes.106 

Salads and Dressing.108 

Diet Dressing.108 

Mahdah Mayonnaise.no 

Mutton Jelly.114 

Artichoke.116 

Cabbage and Celery Salad.116 

Fish Salad.117 

Harlequin Salad.117 

Hashed Lamb Salad.118 

Pineapple Salad.118 

Russian Salad.119 

Sourkraut Salad . 119 

Sorrel and Lettuce.119 

Desserts .. 

Apple Mould.120 

Lemon Jelly.. 

Lemon Sponge.123 

Souffles.124 

The Reason Why.127 

Forbidden Food and Why.129 

































A PREFACE 

BY 

VANCE THOMPSON 
I 


THE TRAGEDY OF FAT 


t4f I 'HE fate of nations depends 
A upon how they are fed.” 
This historic remark was made a cen¬ 
tury ago—shortly after the battle 
of Waterloo—by that meditative 
Frenchman, Brillat-Savarin. He had 
seen the mighty French empire fall to 
pieces in the hands of a fat Napoleon. 
He had foretold the sad event as he 
watched the young hero take on 
paunch and jowls—and join the gro¬ 
tesque band of the gastrophori. No 
one heeded him. He was a prophet 


2 EAT AND GROW THIN 

without honor. And when the fat 
man fell—and shook Europe to pieces 
—he wrote his famous essay on cor¬ 
pulency, in which he tried (as so many 
have vainly tried!) to lead mankind 
out into the lean pastures of life. 
With what splendid clamor did he 
trumpet the joys of going hungry— 
not as an end in itself, but as a way 
to aesthetic tenuity. 

And mankind went on being fat. 

It did not want to be fat; but it did 
want to sit at table and eat of roasted 
and boiled and stewed and baked and 
—with gloomy resignation—it ac¬ 
cepted the hulking consequences. 
And fat generation followed fat gen¬ 
eration in a procession, at once tragic 
and grotesque, over the quaking earth. 
Of course there were some, even 


THE TRAGEDY OF FAT 3 

among Brillat-Savarin’s contempo¬ 
raries, who battled against corpulency. 
Lord Byron, a poet famous in those 
years, tried to starve out the enemy— 
and bombarded him with soda-water 
bottles and vinegar-cruets—in vain. 
In our day the battle has been more 
fiercely waged. Men and women of 
the first social importance have fasted 
and rolled on the floor in calisthenic 
contortions. Perhaps they have tri¬ 
umphed in a measure; perhaps they 
have gone forth to table with a more 
awful and more formidable appetite. 

The tragedy of fat! 

One could write books, plays, poems 
on the subject. One thinks of the 
beautiful women one has known— 
loved perhaps—who have vanished 
forever, drowned in an ocean of turbu- 


4 EAT AND GROW THIN 

lence and tallow; of actresses who 
filled one’s soul with shining dreams— 
and now the dreams are wrecked on 
huge promontories; of statesmen and 
rulers who cumber the earth, now 
mere teeth and stomach, as though 
God had created them, like Mirabeau, 
only to show to what extent the human 
skin can be stretched without break¬ 
ing. The tragedy of fat! 

An ancient man said: “Plures 
crapula quam gladius ”—gluttony 
kills more than the sword; but the 
saddest part is that it kills with a death 
more horrible. One may face with 
fair courage the lean and bony fellow 
with the scythe—meet him with grim 
fortitude; but the boldest man shud¬ 
ders at the thought of a fat death; as 
one who sinks in a sebaceous sea- 


II 

THE WRONG WAY 


I T is a melancholy fact that one is 
what one is born to be. One’s des¬ 
tiny is written more or less clearly on 
one’s face. Thus, statisticians aver, 
out of a hundred persons who die of 
consumption, ninety have brown or 
fair hair, a long face and a sharp nose. 
This calculation may not be scrupu¬ 
lously exact, but there is less doubt as 
to the assertion that out of a hundred 
who are corpulent there are ninety 
with short faces, round eyes and blunt 
noses. Young and beautiful a girl 
passes—she is dainty, rosy, alert, with 
a roguish nose and adorable cheeks; 

5 


6 EAT AND GROW THIN 

but one knows that a little further 
down the road of life she will be seized 
upon by the Occult Powers and muf¬ 
fled in fat—for that destiny is written 
in her round, young face. 

And is there neither cure nor pallia¬ 
tion? 

There are—on the assurance of a 
distinguished statesman who has tried 
them all—at least one hundred obes¬ 
ity cures. One may boil out the fat 
or bake it out or drug it out; one may 
resort to the more natural—and more 
economical—method of the hibernat¬ 
ing bear, and live on it. Unfortu¬ 
nately all these methods have two irre¬ 
mediable defects: 

In the first place, they are not per¬ 
manent; 

And, secondly, they are injurious. 


THE WRONG WAY 7 

It is evident that a fat man in tolera- 
, ble health—he is never in perfect 
health, for a fat man is an ill man—* 
can boil out a great deal of his fat in a 
Russian bath, but the cure is neithef 
lasting nor safe. There v/as a Pari¬ 
sian banker, a few years ago, who may 
serve as an illustrative warning. He 
had grown very corpulent, weighing 
awful hundreds of pounds; and, natu¬ 
rally enough, his affairs went to the 
bad. (There is a strange kinship be¬ 
tween obesity and financial crime— 
almost all embezzlers are fat.) With 
what funds he could filch from the 
bank he fled to a provincial town. 
There he spent every day in a Turkish 
bath, going stealthily to his lodgings 
at dusk. At the end of six weeks his 
own wife would not have known him. 


8 EAT AND GROW THIN 

The fat had sluiced from him like 
melted butter from a colander. Con¬ 
fident that no one would recognize in 
him the fat banker, he walked the 
streets boldly. And at the first corner 
the police arrested him. They did not 
know him; they arrested him simply 
because he looked as though he should 
be locked up—he looked like a man 
who had stolen a fat man’s skin and 
was running away in it. The skin 
hung and flapped in dry folds on his 
cheeks and neck; when they undressed 
him the sight was more awful still. 
The detectives (the French detectives 
are the shrewdest in the world) fed 
him on carbonaceous food and in a 
few weeks he puffed out to his former 
dimensions, when they had no diffi- 


THE WRONG WAY 9 

culty in identifying him as the run¬ 
away banker. 

All the violent anti-obesity cures 
are touched with this defect—they 
work no permanent result and, in ad¬ 
dition, though they may destroy the 
fat they leave the body shriveled, 
wrinkled, uncomely. One might as 
well be fat as to walk the earth in a 
fat man’s misfit skin. And one had 
far better be fat than ruin one’s diges¬ 
tion with drugs, weaken the body by 
fasting, and strip it of all symmetry 
by undue exercise and devastating 
baths. 

Excessive fat is a disease, but vio¬ 
lent cures end in deadlier diseases. 

And is there no cure, at once suave 
and certain? 


10 EAT AND GROW THIN 


There certainly is; and to make it 
known this little book has been writ¬ 
ten by an expert in food values— Doc - 
trix doctorum. 



THE RIGHT WAY 


T HERE is nothing new about the 
Mahdah method of destroying > 
corpulency. It is as old as Galen. It 
was known to Avicenna and to Fi- 
cinus, as it is known to the youngest 
doctor sitting on the tail-board of an 
ambulance. 

One may put it in a word or two: 

Eat the right kind of food. 

There is no need of starving to get 
one’s weight down to the proper stand¬ 
ard of beauty and efficiency. One 
may dine and dine well if one will but 
dine wisely. One may indulge one¬ 
self in the exquisite pleasures of a per- 


12 EAT AND GROW THIN 


fectly composed dinner—so long as it 
be scientifically composed. One may 
lead a life of perfect gustatorial satis¬ 
faction—without ascetic restrictions. 
Even the round-faced girl—for whom 
the hideous phantom of obesity lies in 
wait at the cross-roads of middle life— 
need not shun the pleasant table-joys; 
she may eat if only she will wisely eat. 

Certain foods make for fat; and it 
is upon these carbonaceous foods— 
starches and sugars and oils—that fat 
humanity unwisely feeds. 

(To the scientist there is nothing so 
tragic on earth as the sight of a fat 
man eating a potato.) 

The human animal, lean or obese, 
must eat and, if he is to know the glory 
of health, he must eat well. Starva¬ 
tion diets never did anyone any good; 


THE RIGHT WAY 13 

they may be put definitely aside— 
with the wasting drugs and the fat- 
devouring baths. 

There is only one right way of com¬ 
bating corpulency and that is to eat— 
and grow thin; it is the way Mahdah 
points out in her book. 

There is no guess-work about it. It 
has been tried and tested on both sides 
of the sea. In Paris, London, New 
York; on both sides of the sea innu¬ 
merable ladies walk to and fro in slim 
pulchritude, amazing their friends; 
they have come back from the cross¬ 
roads of middle life, leaving behind 
them the obese phantom; and their 
eyes, young and bright, look out of 
fair, wrinkleless faces. It is as though 
they had gone down into the springs 
of life and come, regenerate, up into 


14 EAT AND GROW THIN 

the world again. Innumerable ladies 
—and a few men. Not so many men; 
for it is a dolesome truth that fat men 
are not so keen on winning back 
youthful vigor and a young waist as 
women are; but there is withal a long 
list of men who have joined the self- 
satisfied band of those who eat—and 
grow thin. (We are a vain lot of 
people, we admit—we flaunt our slim 
comeliness in the face of fat human¬ 
ity and smile, rather self-consciously, 
when Monsieur Cent-Kilos and his 
wife go by, for our ideal of plastic 
beauty is the panther and not the pig.) 

And the rule is a simple one:— 

Eat the right food rightly prepared . 

One might fancy that a table from 
which the carbonaceous foods were 
well-nigh banished would have a mea- 


THE RIGHT WAY 15 

ger look, but one has only to read the 
Mahdah menus—read and inwardly 
digest them—to discover that there are 
subtler gastronomic joys than those af¬ 
forded by devouring potatoes or swal¬ 
lowing lumps of fat. This diet sup¬ 
plies the exact foods required by the 
fat man or fat woman—not only for 
the reducing of flesh but as well for the 
upbuilding of healthy tissue and the 
strengthening of the whole body. The 
Mahdah menus are arranged accord¬ 
ing to the seasons. In summer, for in¬ 
stance, the minimum amount of car¬ 
bonaceous foods enters into the diet. 
For the winter months the heat-pro¬ 
ducing foods are more freely admitted. 
There need be no insistence on this 
point, for the menus themselves are 
explicit. 


16 EAT AND GROW THIN 


Perhaps it is well to point out that 
it is not necessary—in order to grow 
thin—to eat every dish given in the 
menu for the day. A man at once fat 
and poor might find some of the dishes 
beyond his purse. He is to be congrat¬ 
ulated , for he will lose flesh just so 
much more rapidly than his fat and 
richer brother. For of course one does 
not want to eat too much. The idea is 
to eat enough—as a panther does; and 
not to eat too much after the manner 
of a less aesthetic animal. It would be 
difficult for anyone to get fat or stay 
fat on the bill-of-fare which has been 
scientifically prepared for this book, 
but one will grow thin more quickly, 
more healthfully, more comfortably, if 
one does not eat too much—even of 
these lean dishes. 


THE RIGHT WAY 17 

Another point, and one of impor¬ 
tance— 

No wine list is printed on the back of 
the Mahdah menus. This deficiency 
is not due to any “mystical horror of 
fermented drinks”—it is due to the 
somber fact that wine makes for corpu¬ 
lency. (Beer and ale are worse still.) 
One who will have his wine, in spite of 
this warning, should not go beyond a 
glass or two of dry, white-wine. Bet¬ 
ter not; in fact drink of any kind is a 
bad thing at meals—even water; that 
way fat lies; an hour after the meal 
one may drink, and the best thing to 
drink is some such mineral water as 
Vichy or Vittel. 

(And above all, don’t sleep too 
much.) 


IV 


THE FAT MAN IN BROADWAY 

B RILLAT SAVARIN, like many 
French gentlemen, fled to the 
United States to escape the “Terreur” 
of 1793. He observed, as many other 
travelers have, the unusual proportion 
of fat men in New York. Is it a heri¬ 
tage of Dutch ancestry ? Or is it due, 
as Brillat surmised, to the extraordi¬ 
nary amount of pastries, pies, sweets 
and corn-products eaten in that com¬ 
monwealth? Conjecture runs amok. 
Walking in Broadway in the first 
years of the nineteenth century, Bril- 
lat-Savarin saw a man—a monument, 

a mountain of a man—who might 
18 


THE FAT MAN 


19 


serve as lesson to this later (and 
scarce leaner) century; and he wrote: 

“The most extraordinary instance of 
corpulency I have ever seen was that 
of an inhabitant of New York, whom 
many of my readers must have seen 
sitting in a tavern in Broadway, on an 
enormous arm-chair with legs strong 
enough to bear a church. Edward 
was at least six feet four in height; 
and, as his fat had swelled him out in 
every direction, he was over eight feet 
at least in girth. His fingers were like 
those of the Roman Emperor who used 
his wife’s bracelets for rings; his arms 
and thighs were cylindrical, as thick 
as the waist of an ordinary man; and 
his feet like those of an elephant, cov¬ 
ered with the overlapping fat of the 
legs. His lower eyelids were kept 


20 EAT AND GROW THIN 

down by the weight of the fat on his 
cheeks; but what made him more hide¬ 
ous than anything else was the three 
round chins of more than a foot long 
hanging over his breast, so that his face 
looked like the capital of a truncated 
pillar. 

“He sat thus beside a window of a 
low room opening on the street, drink¬ 
ing from time to time a glass of ale, of 
which there was a huge pitcher always 
near. 

“His singular appearance could not 
fail to attract the attention of the pass¬ 
ers-by, but they had to be careful not 
to remain too long. Edward quickly 
sent them about their business, calling 
out, in his deep tones, ‘What are you 
staring at like wild-cats?’—‘Go on 
your way, you lazy body’—‘Off with 


THE FAT MAN 


21 


you, you good-for-nothing dogs.’ 
During several conversations I had 
with him, he assured me he was by no 
means unhappy and that if death did 
not come to disturb his plans, he could 
willingly remain as he was to the end 
of the world.” 

Now this little fragment of local 
history is not without significance. 
Edward, elephant-footed, girthed like 
a caisson, was content to remain as he 
was. He had none of the shame of 
fatness that stings even the most in¬ 
different American to-day. To-day 
no fat man pretends that he is paunch- 
proud. He would fain be like other 
men—his height measurably greater 
than his width. 


V 


RATHER PERSONAL 

T HE worst of being fat is that it 
makes one ridiculous. 

The witty man, doomed—I am 
thinking of course of Mr. G. K. Ches¬ 
terton—to walk the world in a suit of 
tallow, tries to fend off the laughter 
of others by laughing first at himself. 
He is heroic and pathetic, a subject 
for tears, not laughter—jest he never 
so waggishly! No; the fat man may 
clown and slap himself and wag a 
droll forefinger, but he is not merry 
at all; and if one should sink a shaft 
down to his heart—or drive a tunnel 


22 


RATHER PERSONAL 23 

through to it—one would discover 
that it is a sad heart, black with mel¬ 
ancholy. Down there, deep under the 
billowy surface of the man, all is 
gloom. He knows he is ridiculous. 
Rude persons think he has no feeling. 
But almost always he is a man of fine 
and tender feelings; only they are 
covered up. 

He falls in love. (It is a destiny 
—like being born with the sun in 
Aquarius; always the fat man falls in 
love.) And this is his bitterest 
tragedy. He cannot kneel at Beauty’s 
feet without a derrick to let him 
down; and a man who goes a-wooing 
with a derrick looks like a fool. He 
cannot clasp the dear girl to his heart 
—for fear of smothering her. 


24 EAT AND GROW THIN 

What can the poor man do? 

Fierce burn the fires of love within 
him and the fiercer they burn the 
faster flees the terrified girl—for he 
looks like a vat of boiling oil; and that 
is a fearsome thing to fall into. So, 
wrapped in tallow, the poor lover goes 
his sebaceous way. 

Love is not for him! 

For him there is only the “window 
of a low room opening on the street,” 
where he may sit and jeer at himself 
to keep his friends from jeering. 

A tragedy in suet. 

Have I spoken feelingly of that 
man? 

I lay down my pen and cross the 
floor and look into the tall mirror; I am 
confronted by the reflection of a slight 


RATHER PERSONAL 25 

man, slim-waisted, with narrow, beau¬ 
tiful legs—and I admire his lean gra- 
cility; and then I think of Edward in 
the historic Broadway window, and I 
say to the image in the mirror: “Even 
such as he you might have been had it 
not been for the Mahdah menus!” 

For I narrate this fabula of myself. 

I, too, might have been like Mr. 
Chesterton—without the wit, but with 
the shame of fatness on me. Too 
long I had lived in the restaurants of 
the world—fed too full of Paris 
(guided by the wonderful table-book 
of Rowland Strong), of Vienna, of 
Rome. The gracilities, whereof there 
has been sufficient mention, were slip¬ 
ping away from me, hiding themselves 
in festoons and furbelows of fat. For 


26 EAT AND GROW THIN 


months, for a year, I knew it not. One 
never does know that one is getting 
fat. One knows that other people are 
getting fat—that they are fat. But 
oneself? Never! One’s tailor is a 
liar and his tape-measure a fraud. 
One’s shirt-maker is in the conspiracy. 
Then at last there comes a day—the 
unavoidable day— 

Do you remember the unhappy 
swallow who discovered (with horror) 
that he did not make a summer? 

It is that way. One day (with hor¬ 
ror) you discover you are fat. You 
see it in your mirror. More tragically 
you may see it in a woman’s eyes. 
Then of two things, one: Either you 
sink, cowardly, in the sea of tallow 


RATHER PERSONAL 27 

and your life as a man is over; or, you 
“take advice.” 

Frankly I am one of those who took 
advice. That is why I was asked to 
write a preface to this book—which 
might have been called “The Fat Per¬ 
son’s Vade Mecuni after all, per¬ 
haps “Eat—and Grow Thin” is bet¬ 
ter; for, if you follow this method, 
you may eat, eat of savorsome dishes 
—in a word, you may dine—and eat¬ 
ing you will grow thin. 

And stay thin. 

As the book speaks up for itself 
I do not see what need there is for a 
preface at all. But Mahdah was not 
of that opinion; said she: “A book 
without a preface is as inconvenant as 


28 EAT AND GROW THIN 

a man without a collar on.” Where¬ 
fore I button on this collar (a detach¬ 
able collar, fortunately—and you can 
take it off if you wish) and tie round 
it a mauve necktie. 


VI 


ABOUT THE BOOK 

A S I have said, Mahdah’s method 
is an ancient one—known even 
to the young gentleman who drops off 
the tail-end of the ambulance. It is 
based on a scientific knowledge of food 
values. All that information you may 
get for yourself. Any reputable phy¬ 
sician will tell you—for a few hun¬ 
dred dollars—to stop eating starch, 
sugar and the like. He will even 
draw up a pretty diagram in black and 
white. Or your little boy or little girl 
—if she, too, is out of the kindergarten 
—can do it for you, after school. 
Only—the fatting man or the woman 


20 


30 EAT AND GROW THIN 

“taking on flesh”—is not much better 
off for advice or diagram. It is all 
very well to know one can’t eat po¬ 
tatoes and bacon and macaroni and 
those attractive cakes which grace the 
tea table; but what CAN one eat? 

The Mahdah menus tell you ex¬ 
actly what to eat. Each luncheon is 
complete in itself. Each dinner pro¬ 
vides exactly the nutriment needed 
and in exactly the right proportions. 
And breakfast? Oh, we of the slim- 
waisted gracilities breakfast on a cup 
of tea without milk or a cup of black 
coffee or a dish of fresh, ripe fruit. 

With these menus the housekeeper 
may set a table at once non-fattening 
and delicious. From these menus the 
man who dines in the restaurants may 


ABOUT THE BOOK 31 

select what tempting dinners he 
pleases—and get thin by eating them. 
For (it cannot be said too often) these 
menus were devised by an expert and 
accomplished dinner-maker— ingeni - 
osa ad gulam. 

Of course there are certain rules to 
be observed. 

If you have bought this book from 
honorable motives (and not merely 
to read the preface) you will observe 
these rules; and if you do, you will 
find at the end of a few months—say 
three—that the image in your mirror 
will have lost twenty pounds. The 
many people who have followed this 
method have lost—I state an average 
—two pounds a week after the first 
three weeks. Slowly—little by little, 


32 EAT AND GROW THIN 

pleasurably—not sacrificing table- 
joys—you will win back the winsome 
waist of youth. 

Possibly, you say? 

Inevitably. It is axiomatic: Fat 
foods make fat and lean foods make 
for leanness. And the Mahdah menus 
show the lean way. 


HOW TO EAT AND GROW 
THIN 

By Mahdah 


S OMETIMES corpulency is due 
to over-eating and then it may be 
checked by the “starvation cure”; but 
usually this drastic treatment is dan¬ 
gerous and unnecessary. Corpulency 
(unless it is the result of definite dis¬ 
ease) is most commonly caused by 
wrong eating—that is, by eating too 
much carbonaceous food, such as 
starches, sugars, oils and other fats. 
The average diet consists very largely 
of fat-making foods, beginning with 
soup and going down through the list 
of meats dressed with sauce, of pota- 

33 


34 EAT AND GROW THIN 

toes, macaroni, bread, butter, cream, 
cheeses, ending with pastries, pud¬ 
dings and sweets. When such a meal 
is eaten, accompanied by draughts of 
beer, or a bottle of wine, there is set 
up in the body a fat-producing factory 
and the result, especially for those 
who are predisposed to corpulency, is 
inevitable. It follows that the nat¬ 
ural cure for corpulency is to stop 
eating the fat-producing foods. 
Then, slowly the body will use up the 
excess of fat. This process may take 
a number of months, the time depend¬ 
ing upon the degree of corpulency, 
but it is a process without danger, 
without injury to the health, without 
unpleasant self-sacrifice and, also, the 
gradual elimination of fat leaves the 


HOW TO EAT 


35 

body healthy and strong and so far 
from wrinkling or deforming the skin 
restores it to its natural freshness and 
beauty. 

The average loss of weight in those 
who have faithfully followed the 
method described in this book is for 
women about two pounds a week af¬ 
ter the first three weeks, during which 
time very little decrease is noticeable; 
for men the reduction is a trifle less. 
A great deal of course depends upon 
the temperament, the environment 
and the amount of exercise taken, but 
anyone who will honestly collaborate 
in the cure, should lose from twenty 
to twenty-five pounds in the course of 
the first three months. And when the 
desired weight has been attained, the 


36 EAT AND GROW THIN 

rules need not be so strictly obeyed, 
but one who has once followed the 
non-fattening diet is not at all likely 
ever to return to oily, starchy or sugary 
food. 

Many fat people eat too much. Al¬ 
most all corpulent persons sleep too 
much. From these two facts the fol¬ 
lowing rule may be deduced: “Eat 
less than you have been in the habit of 
eating; and sleep less/ 5 

The things you must not eat are 
these: 

“FORBIDDEN FOOD 55 

1st: Pork, ham, bacon and the fat 
of any meat. 

2nd: Bread, biscuits, cakes, any¬ 
thing made of the flour of wheat, 


HOW TO EAT 


37 

maize, rye, barley, oats, etc. Cereals 
and “breakfast foods 55 must never be 
eaten. 

3rd: Rice, macaroni, potatoes, 
maize, dried beans, lentils. 

4th: Milk, cream, cheese, butter. 

5th: Olive oils, or grease of any 
kind. 

6th: Pies, cakes, puddings, pas¬ 
tries, custards. 

7th: Iced creams, sweetened aer¬ 
ated-water, etc. 

8th: Chocolates, sweets. 

9th: Wines, beers, ales, spirits. 

It may seem at first glance that 
when these things are taken away 
there is left only a disguised kind of 
starvation; but the most casual in¬ 
spection of the Mahdah menus will 


38 EAT AND GROW THIN 

show that the fattening foods are 
really superfluous and that more than 
enough remains to furnish a gourmets 
table. What has been taken away is: 
Starch, sugar, oil and alcohol—noth¬ 
ing else; and their removal from the 
diet of the corpulent person means the 
certain loss of corpulency. The 
menus here given are based on an ex¬ 
act knowledge of just what must be 
eaten in order to nourish the body 
without fattening it. They are so 
combined that they give the variety of 
food necessary for a normal person in 
a proper nutritive ratio.. 

In cooking the various dishes it 
should be remembered that very 
little butter, and no oil, fats or grease 
are to be used. None of the plats 


HOW TO EAT 


39 

given in the menus require fats, flour, 
or sugar. Where sweetening is neces¬ 
sary, saccharine tablets—the half¬ 
grain tablet is the most convenient— 
should be used, while a clear gravy 
must take the place of a flour thick¬ 
ened sauce for any made meat dish. 
The recipes not usually printed in 
cookery books are printed at the back 
of this book. When recipes are not 
given those of any ordinary cookery 
book may be followed, if it is always 
borne in mind that flour, sugar, milk, 
etc., are NOT TO BE USED. But 
only such dishes as are wholly satis¬ 
factory without these fattening in¬ 
gredients have been given a place in 
the menus. 


DON’T 


Don’t sleep too much. 

Don’t take naps. 

Don’t overeat, even of lean dishes. 
Don’t eat unless you are hungry. 
Don’t drink with your meals. 

Don’t drink alcoholic beverages. 
Don’t eat bread—except gluten 
bread toasted, and this in moderation. 
Don’t take a cab—WALK. 


THE LAWS OF DIET 



ES, the list of things one must not 


X eat may seem rather appalling 
when one looks at it for the first time. 
Soup and bread and potatoes and ba¬ 
con and sweets and one’s wine or beer 
seem almost a necessary part of the 
daily meals to one who has never done 
without them. Bread perhaps is the 
hardest thing to do without, but after 
a while the stomach ceases to demand 
it and one does not miss it from the 
daily diet, when gluten bread is used 
as a substitute. 

When one is in the habit of drinking 
with one’s meals it is at first difficult to 
do without every kind of drink—even 


42 EAT AND GROW THIN 

water—but after a few days “dry eat¬ 
ing” becomes a matter of course; and 
it will be found that a much smaller 
quantity of food satisfies the appetite. 

The list of things one may eat is far 
longer than the list of forbidden 
things. For breakfast there is fruit, 
fresh or stewed, and twice a week 
boiled or poached eggs may be served; 
coffee or tea—without cream or milk, 
of course, but sweetened, if desired, 
by saccharine. Then in the menus 
given for luncheons and dinners there 
will be found : 

All kinds of meat (except pig in any 
form). 

All kinds of game. 

All kinds of sea-food—fish, lob¬ 
sters, oysters, etc. 


THE LAWS OF DIET 43 

All kinds of fruit (except the ba¬ 
nana, fig, and grape). 

All kinds of salad—except those 
made of forbidden vegetables. 

All kinds of meat jellies. 

Mushrooms, tomatoes, cucumbers, 
peppers, olives, celery, pickles, chili 
sauce, Worcestershire sauce. 

All green vegetables, such as: 
French beans, spinach, Brussels 
sprouts, cauliflower, celery, beets, 
beet-tops, curly kale (cooked like 
spinach), turnips, carrots, marrow, 
salsify, cabbage, endives, artichokes, 
radishes, lettuce (which may like¬ 
wise be cooked like spinach), cress, 
parsnips, aubergines, tomatoes, on¬ 
ions, asparagus—and any others men¬ 
tioned in the list of menus. 


44 EAT AND GROW THIN 

It is evident that one’s choice of ap¬ 
petizing dishes is not greatly restricted 
and that one may eat very well with 
the happy certainty, also, of growing 
thin. 

The food that has been selected in 
the accompanying menus for daily 
consumption contains all that is 
needed for the sustenance of the body 
—everything needed to strengthen 
brain and body—and no needed food- 
value has been neglected or over¬ 
looked. Each menu is composed of an 
agreeable variety of specially selected 
and specially tested dishes and, by ad¬ 
ding a plat of forbidden food (if one 
wishes to fatten a lean guest), one 
may give a dinner of which Voisin or 
Durand would boast. The hostess 


THE LAWS OF DIET 45 

has only to hand the book of menus to 
her cook and think no more about it. 

There are many things to consider 
in preparing a diet, beyond the mere 
elimination of non-fattening foods. 
These menus have been arranged not 
merely to make you thin (any starva¬ 
tion diet will do that) but to build up 
the tissues and give perfect health . 
To gain this end you must eat and eat 
well; and that is what you will do 
when you begin to follow the menus . 

It is almost as important to guard 
against fat as it is to get rid of it, so 
these menus will prove useful to many 
who have not yet crossed the border 
line of corpulency. And to the cor¬ 
pulent it should be said: “Never un¬ 
der any circumstances—even when 


46 EAT AND GROW THIN 

you have reduced to the desired 
weight and have, to some degree, dis¬ 
continued the diet—never eat pota¬ 
toes, rice, white bread (toasted glu¬ 
ten bread is much more nourishing and 
not fattening), macaroni or sweets or 
pastries. 

Recipes for the less common dishes 
are given. The others will be found 
in most cookery books. 

Regarding the Turkish, Spanish 
and Russian dishes given, they may 
be eaten or not, as you wish. For in¬ 
stance, the Dolmas or Turkish mut¬ 
ton is a very nice dish, and it has 
nothing fattening in it, but plain 
boiled mutton with mint or caper 
sauce will be simpler and answer the 
purpose quite as well—if not better. 


THE LAWS OF DIET 47 

The same applies to the Srasis or veal, 
Polish style. Plain roast veal can be 
substituted, though Srasis makes an 
agreeable change. 

Barsch, also, may be too compli¬ 
cated for some kitchens. In that case 
replace it by serving plain roast duck. 

Baked or steamed apples and pears 
are recommended. 

Use saccharine to sweeten the water 
used in the cooking with the addition 
of a sliced lemon and some nutmeg. 
For those who are already very stout, 
I would suggest a lunch consisting 
simply of salad and fresh, ripe fruit 
several times a week. 

For all salads use Diet Dressing or 
Boiled Dressing. See pages 108 and 


110 . 


48 EAT AND GROW THIN 

All the vegetables should be boiled 
in water and seasoned with salt and 
pepper. Paprika is very flavorsome 
and underdone meat juice of any kind 
(if lean) poured over the vegetables 
adds to their flavor. Chili sauce and 
similar sauces add to the flavor of 
the vegetables. 

Those who select the plainest dishes 
in the menus will reduce the quickest. 

It is true of course that the nutritive 
value of food lies in the relation which 
the several substances bear to the or¬ 
ganism they are to nourish. No two 
human organisms are exactly alike and 
the thinning diet laid down in these 
menus must be—like any diet of 
whatever nature—more or less modi¬ 
fied to suit individual cases, but such 


THE LAWS OF DIET 49 

changes are easily made. If the mut¬ 
ton in one day’s menu does not agree 
with you, you have but to replace it 
with beef; and if you do not like duck 
you may take a fowl instead. But in 
most of the menus no substitution will 
be necessary; they are ample enough 
to permit you to pick and choose, while 
if your means do not permit you to eat 
of the expensive foods, the cheaper 
kinds may be substituted. 

This natural, simple method of cur¬ 
ing obesity has brought health and 
happiness to hundreds of the corpu¬ 
lent and, wherever it has been tried, 
it has proved unfailingly successful. 
You have but to follow it faithfully 
and loyally, and it will do for you 
what it has done for others. You have 


50 EAT AND GROW THIN 

only to persevere and week by week 
and month by month you will see that 
you are going back to your healthy, 
normal condition, having lost all su¬ 
perfluous fat and recovered pristine 
energy. 

Above all, be cheerful. Try and 
SEE yourself growing thin. Remem¬ 
ber the mind exercises a powerful in¬ 
fluence on the body. And do not for¬ 
get that an indolent, indoor life—the 
breakfast in bed and afternoon-nap 
kind of life—slowly but surely in¬ 
creases flesh. 

In addition to eating the right food 
try and lead the right life. 


THE MAHDAH MENUS 


THE MAHDAH MENUS 


N OTE.—When fresh vegetables 
cannot be obtained or are out 
of season, bottled or canned vege¬ 
tables should be used; bottled vege¬ 
tables, too, should be kept in stock, 
and owners of gardens would be wise 
to preserve plenty of spinach puree, 
tomato puree and cauliflower. Home¬ 
made pickles, seasoning vinegars, and 
chutneys give a variety to the diet. 
When sweet dishes are mentioned 
they must be sweetened with saccha¬ 
rine. It is well to ask the chemist how 
many tablets make one grain, as very 

very little must be used. Otherwise 
52 


THE MAHDAH MENUS 53 

you will impart an unpleasant flavor 
to the dish. 

If the dishes suggested are found to 
be too expensive for all purses, any 
of the simpler ones may be substi¬ 
tuted. This is why the menus given 
are so varied and so ample. You can, 
if you like, plan two dinners out of 
one, or you may partake of the whole 
bill of fare, but in all cases if you 
faithfully adhere to the rules you will 
Eat and Grow Thin. 

Recipes are given at the back of the 
book for dishes marked with a star (*). 

Wherever a sauce is necessary it 
may be thickened with the beaten 
yokes of eggs or with thick puree of 
tomato, but sauces are to be eaten only 


on rare occasions. 



THE MAHDAH MENUS 

FOR 

DECEMBER, JANUARY AND 
FEBRUARY 

Dinner 

Oysters. 

Fish in season. 

Roast Turkey, with cranberry sauce. 
String Beans. 

Lettuce and Endive Salad.* 

Fruit. 

Lunch 

Minced Turkey. 

Lamb Chops. 

Coleslaw, Mahdah mayonnaise.* 
Stewed Prunes. 


55 


56 EAT AND GROW THIN 


Dinner 

Oyster Cocktails.* 

Fish. 

* Dolmas (Mutton Turkish fashion) 
Broiled Mushrooms. 

* Roast Pheasant. 

Salad (diet dressing).* 

Apple Souffle.* 

Lunch 

* Stuffed Eggs. 

■ Quail with Brussels Sprouts. 

Salad (diet dressing). 

Sliced Oranges. 


Oysters. Dinner 
F ish. 

Porterhouse Steak. 

Sliced Beets (boiled). 

Grapefruit Salad (diet dressing). 


THE MAHDAH MENUS 57 
Lunch 

Grilled Lobster. 

Calves Liver, with onions. 

Green Vegetable. 

Salad, Minced Celery, Apples and 
Pears (diet dressing) .* 

Dinner 
Hors d’CEuvre. 

Mince of Mushrooms.* 

Fish. 

Roast Guinea-fowl, with pickled wal¬ 
nuts. 

Mashed Turnips. 

Lettuce Salad (Mahdah mayon¬ 
naise) .* 

Prune Souffle. 

Lunch 

Steamed Oysters. 

Cold Fowl in Aspic.* 


58 EAT AND GROW THIN 

< Lamb Chops. 

Stewed Celery. 

Lemon Sponge. 

Dinner 

Clams on Half-shell. 

* Fish. 

Boiled Tongue, tomato sauce. 
Brussels Sprouts. 

• Roast Partridge. 

Green Salad (diet dressing).* 
Apple Souffle. 


Lunch 

Scallops (boiled), any relish. 
Poached Eggs in Aspic.* 

Green Vegetables. 

Stewed Rhubarb. 


THE MAHDAH MENUS 59 
Dinner 

Oysters. 

Baked Fish. 

Roast Veal. 

Macedoine of Vegetables. 

Salad (diet dressing) .* 

Orange Gelatine. 

Lunch 

Devilled Tongue.* 

• Calves Brains, with Puree of Tomato. 
' Cold Veal, with Salad (diet dress¬ 
ing). 

Baked Apples. 

Dinner 
Clam Cocktails. 

• Boiled Fish (any relish) . 

• Barsch (duck, Polish style )\ 
Cauliflower. 


6o EAT AND GROW THIN 


Russian Salad (Mahdah mayon¬ 
naise) .* 

Sliced Pineapple. 

Lunch 

Mahdah Mince. 

Cold Duck (any relish). 

Salad. 

Fruit Souffle.* 

Dinner 

Fish. 

Sweetbreads with Mushrooms. 

Filet of Beef, with puree of celery 
root. 

Stewed Tomatoes, with green peppers 
and onions. 

Grapefruit Salad (diet dressing) .* 


THE MAHDAH MENUS 61 

Lunch 

Broiled Sole. 

Cold Beef, with horse-radish. 
Coleslaw (Mahdah mayonnaise) .* 
Baked Apples flavored with lemon. 

Dinner 
Oyster Cocktail. 

Fish in season. 

Hare (with sour kraut) .* 

Salad of Boiled Beets of Crisp Let¬ 
tuce (diet dressing) .* 

Compote of Mixed Fruits. 

Lunch 

Broiled Kidneys, with mushrooms. 
Cold Hare. 

Endive Salad (diet dressing) .* 
Stewed Fruit. 


62 EAT AND GROW THIN 


Dinner 

Steamed Oysters. 

Boiled Fish, Tomato Catsup. 

Leg of Lamb. 

String Beans. 

Artichokes (vinaigrette).* 

Coffee Gelatine. 

Lunch 

Mahdah Mince.* 

Poached Eggs, with puree of Turnip. 
Cold Lamb, Mint Sauce. 

Salad. 

Souffle of Prune.* 


THE MAHDAH MENUS 

FOR 

MARCH, APRIL AND MAY 

Dinner 
Hors d’CEuvre. 

Mince of Mushrooms.* 

Fish (in season). 

Boiled or Broiled Chicken. 

Parsnips and Onions. 

Russian Salad (Mahdah mayon¬ 
naise) .* 

Spiced Fruit. 

Lunch 

Olives, Celery. 

Omelette, with chopped parsley. 

63 


64 EAT AND GROW THIN 

Minced Chicken, with mushrooms. 
Fresh Pineapple. 

Dinner 

Broiled Shad. 

Roast Lamb, mint sauce. 

String Beans, with minced carrots. 
Sliced Boiled Beet Salad, Lettuce 
(diet dressing) .* 

Orange Water Ice. 

Lunch 

Grapefruit. 

Poached Eggs on Asparagus Tips. 
Cold Roast Lamb. 

Tomato Gelatine, with lettuce (Mah- 
dah mayonnaise).* 

Stewed Rhubarb. 


THE MAHDAH MENUS 65 
Dinner 

Fish. 

Sweetbreads, with truffles. 

Roast Duckling, stuffed with olives 
and celery. 

Eggplant, Turkish style.* 

Fresh pineapple. 

Lunch 

Steamed Oysters. 

Cold Duckling, with hot apple sauce. 
Salad. 

Mandarines. 

Dinner 

Soft Shell Crabs. 

Stewed Chicken Giblets. 

Cauliflower. 

Galantine of chicken in Aspic. 
Endive Salad (diet dressing).* 
Lemon Sponge.* 


66 EAT AND GROW THIN 


Lunch 

Boiled Scallops, with chili sauce. 
Minced Dried Beef, with poached 
eggs. 

Strawberry Salad (diet dressing).* 
Coffee Water Ice. 

Dinner 

Boiled Cod, with chutney. 

Roast Veal. 

Puree of Turnips. 

Russian Salad (Mahdah mayon¬ 
naise) .* 

Compote of Mixed Fruits. 

Lunch 

Hors d’CEuvre. 

Chutney-eggs.* 

Kippered Herring. 

Minced Veal, with chopped onions, 
tomato catsup. 

Stewed Prunes. 


THE MAHDAH MENUS 67 

Dinner 

Oyster Cocktail. 

Fish. 

Broiled Spring Chicken. 

Asparagus. 

Harlequin Salad (Mahdah mayon¬ 
naise) .* 

Apple Mould.* 

Lunch 

Grilled Kidneys, with onions. 

Lamb Chops. 

Puree of Spinach. 

Baked Spiced Pears. 

Dinner 

Clams on Half-shell 
Fish. 

Roast Squab, stuffed with olives. 


68 EAT AND GROW THIN 

Puree of Turnips. 

Artichokes (vinaigrette).* 

Stewed Fruit. 

Lunch 

Oyster Cocktail. 

Lamb’s Fries. 

Stewed Tomatoes. 

Mahdah Grill. 

Fruit. 

Dinner 

Hors d’CEuvre. 

Mahdah Appetizer.* 

Roast Lamb. 

Brussels Sprouts. 

Endive and Lettuce Salad (diet dress¬ 
ing).* 

Strawberry Gelatine. 


THE MAHDAH MENUS 69 
Lunch 

Hors d’CEuvre. 

Fish Salad (Mahdah mayonnaise).* 
Veal Chops. 

Puree of Spinach. 

Apricot Water Ice. 

Dinner 

Fish or Crab Flakes. 

Filet of Beef, asparagus tips. 

Minced Boiled Carrots, with onions. 
Stuffed Green Peppers. 

Compote of Strawberries. 

Lunch 

Haddock in Pipkins.* 

Dolmas, with puree of turnips. 

Salad Chickorie (diet dressing).* 
Hot Apple Sauce. 


70 EAT AND GROW THIN 
Dinner 

Lobster. 

Calves Brains, with puree celery-root. 
Roast Chicken, mushrooms. 
Cauliflower Salad, with lettuce and 
(Mahdah mayonnaise)/ 

Souffle of Strawberries. 

Lunch 

Devilled Eggs (served hot), puree of 
tomato. 

Cold Chicken in Aspic. 

Green Salad (diet dressing)/ 

Coffee Water Ice. 


THE MAHDAH MENUS 


FOR 

JUNE, JULY AND AUGUST 

Dinner 
Broiled Salmon. 

Roast Surloin of Beef and Horse¬ 
radish. 

String Beans. 

Baked Tomatoes, with young onions. 
Lettuce Salad (Mahdah mayon¬ 
naise) .* 

Cherry Water Ice. 

Lunch 

Hors d’CEuvre. 

Devilled Tongue. 

71 


72 EAT AND GROW THIN 

Veal Cutlets, with minced carrots. 
Coleslaw (Mahdah mayonnaise).* 
Raspberries. 

Dinner 
Hors d’CEuvre. 

Mince of Mushrooms.* 

Boiled Fish, with walnut sauce. 
Broiled Chicken. 

Asparagus. 

Harlequin Salad (Mahdah mayon¬ 
naise).* 

Apricots and Pears. 

Lunch 

Olives, radishes, young onions. 
Stewed Kidneys, with mushrooms. 
Cold Tongue. 

Sliced Tomatoes, and cucumbers (diet 
dressing). 


THE MAHDAH MENUS 73 

Strawberries. 

Iced Tea. 

Dinner 

Grapefruit, or Fruit Cocktail. 

Fish (in season). 

Roast Lamb. 

Puree of Spinach. 

Egg-plant (Turkish style) .* 

Stewed Currants and Raspberries. 

Lunch 

Omelette, with smoked minced beef. 
Cold Lamb in Aspic. 

Sliced Cucumbers, with young onions 
(diet dressing) .* 

Peaches. 

Dinner 
Broiled Smelts. 

Veal Loaf, with young boiled cab¬ 
bage. 


74 EAT AND GROW THIN 
Asparagus. 

Russian Salad (diet dressing) .* 
Mixed Fruit Souffle. 

Lunch 

Cantaloupe Frappe. 

Lamb Chops. 

Stuffed Tomatoes.* 

Mixed Fruit Salad (diet dressing) .* 
Coffee Gelatine. 

Dinner 

Fish (in season). 

Broiled Steak. 

Puree of young turnips. 

Cold Tongue, with green salad (diet 
dressing).* 

Raspberries. 


THE MAHDAH MENUS 75 
Lunch 

Hors d’GEuvre. 

Salmon in Pipkins.* 

CEufs Mollets, with tomato sauce.* 
Artichokes (sauce vinaigrette).* 
Fruit. 

Iced Tea. 

Dinner 

Figh (in season). 

Roast Capon, or Mixed Grille (cut¬ 
let, chicken, kidney, tomato). 
Asparagus. 

Cold Meat, with salad (diet dress¬ 
ing).* 

Huckleberries. 

Lunch 

Melon. 

Lamb’s Fry, catsup. 

String Beans. 


76 EAT AND GROW THIN 

Mahdah Jellied Pie, with lettuce 
(diet dressing) .* 

Sliced Peaches. 

Dinner 

Dressed Crab. 

Stewed Chicken Giblets, with mush¬ 
rooms or truffles. 

Roast Lamb, mint sauce. 

Sliced (boiled) Turnips and Beets. 
Asparagus Salad (Mahdah mayon¬ 
naise).* 

Strawberry Water Ice. 

Lunch 

Melon Frappe. 

Minced Lamb, with boiled onions. 
Parsnips. 

Stewed Fresh Fruit. 


THE MAHDAH MENUS 77 

Dinner 
Hors d’CEuvre. 

Devilled Tongue. 

Fish. 

Sweetbreads, with truffles. 

Boiled Corned Beef, with young on¬ 
ions and cabbage. 

Tomato Gelatine, with lettuce (Mah- 
dah mayonnaise) .* 

Plum Souffle. 

Lunch 

Melon. 

Corned Beef Hash, tomato catsup. 
Boiled Endives. 

Lemon Sponge.* 

Iced Tea. 

Dinner 
Hors d’CEuvre. 

Mahdah Appetizer.* 


78 EAT AND GROW THIN 

Roast Veal, with baked onions. 
Boiled Beets. 

Cherries. 


Lunch 

Fruit Cocktail. 

Calves’ Liver, with onions. 

Fresh Tomatoes, and lettuce (diet 
dressing) .* 

Stewed Prunes. 

Dinner 

Melon Frappe. 

Fish (in season). 

Boiled Mutton, caper sauce. 

Hot Asparagus flavored with meat 
juice. 

Peach Water Ice. 


THE MAHDAH MENUS 79 
Lunch 

Calves’ Head, sauce vinaigrette.* 
Broiled Spring Chicken. 

Stuffed Tomatoes.* 

Pears and Apricots. 

Iced Tea. 


THE MAHDAH MENUS 

FOR 

SEPTEMBER, OCTOBER AND 
NOVEMBER 

Dinner 

Lobster. 

Dolmas.* 

Puree of Spinach. 

Cold Tongue in Aspic, with lettuce 
(diet dressing) .* 

Apple Mould. 

Lunch 

Steamed Oysters.* 

Toasted Lamb’s Kidneys. 

Stewed Celery. 


8o 


THE MAHDAH MENUS 81 


Salad. 

Stewed Plums. 

Dinner 

Oysters. 

Boiled Fish, with pickled walnuts. 
Saddle of Mutton, caper sauce. 
Boiled Vegetable Marrow. 

Endive Salad (diet dressing) .* 
Baked Spiced Pears. 

Lunch 

Haddock in Pipkins.* 

Calves’ Brains, tomato sauce. 

Cold Mutton in Aspic. 

Lemon Sponge.* 

Dinner 

Boiled Haddock, Lemon and Chopped 
Parsley (any relish). 

Sweetbreads, flavored with meat juice. 


82 EAT AND GROW THIN 


Puree of Squash. 

Roast Fowl. 

Salad (Mahdah mayonnaise) .* 

Peach Water Ice. 

Lunch 

Calves’ Liver, with puree of chopped 
greens.* 

Cold Fowl, with olives and any relish. 
Chicory Salad (diet dressing).* 
Stewed Fruit. 

Dinner 

Oyster Cocktails. 

Fish or Crabs. 

Roast Goose, with apple sauce. 

String Beans, with chopped carrots 
(boiled). 

Salad (in season). 

Berry Souffle. 


THE MAHDAH MENUS 83 
Lunch 

Devilled Tongue (served very hot) .* 
Cold Goose. 

Coleslaw (Mahdah mayonnaise) .* 
Stewed Fruit. 

Dinner 

Oyster Appetizer.* 

Fish: 

Roast Capon. 

Brussels Sprouts. 

Salad. 

Spiced Peaches. 

Lunch 

Hamburger Steak, any relish or cat¬ 
sup. 

Boiled Carrots. 

Fish Salad (Mahdah mayonnaise).* 
Fresh Fruit. 


84 EAT AND GRAW THIN 

Dinner 

Clams. 

Fish. 

Roast Turkey, cranberry sauce. 
Cauliflower. 

Sorrel and Lettuce Salad (diet dress¬ 
ing) .* 

Sliced Oranges. 

Lunch 

Savory Grille.* 

Cold Turkey, with cranberry sauce. 
Salad (diet dressing) .* 

Stewed Plums. 

Dinner 

Steamed Oysters. 

Fish. 

Hashed Turkey, with mushrooms. 


THE MAHDAH MENUS 85 

Russian Salad (Mahdah mayon¬ 
naise) .* 

Orange Water Ice. 

Lunch 

Kidney Omelette. 

Porterhouse Steak. 

Boiled Green Vegetable.* 

Apple Sauce. 

Dinner 
Hors d’CEuvre. 

Mince of Mushrooms. 

Fish. 

Jugged Hare. 

Boiled Chicory (cooked like spinach). 
Salad Grapefruit (diet dressing) .* 

Lunch 

Oysters. 

CEufs Mollets.* 


86 EAT AND GROW THIN 

Puree of Greens.* 

Cold Hare. 

Salad (diet dressing).* 
Watermelon 


™ Dinner 

Clams. 

Fish. 

Roast Partridges. 

String Beans. 

Grapefruit Salad (diet dressing)/ 
Vanilla Water Ice. 


Lunch 

Oyster Appetizer.* 

Lamb Chops, with boiled endives. 
Coleslaw (Mahdah mayonnaise).* 
Mandarines. 


Oysters. 

Salmon. 


Dinner 


THE MAHDAH MENUS 87 

Roast Veal. 

Brussels Sprouts. 

Salad, Escarolle (diet dressing) .* 
Lemon Sponge. 

Lunch 

Clam Cocktail. 

Hashed Veal, tomato sauce. 

Cold Tongue in Aspic, with lettuce. 
Stewed Plums. 



























































.» 



















RECIPES 


















' 




































APPETIZERS AND HORS 
D’QEUVRES 


CHUTNEY-EGGS 
Slice some cooked beetroot rather 
thick, and stamp out the slices with a 
fapcy cutter. Spread with pounded 
chutney and serve a thick slice of 
hard-boiled egg on each. 

CLAM COCKTAIL 
One tablespoonful of tomato cat¬ 
sup, one dessertspoonful of Worces¬ 
tershire sauce, one teaspoonful of on¬ 
ion juice, one drop of Tabasco sauce, 
one teaspoonful of lemon juice. Mix 
well, pour over raw clams, and serve 
in a glass. 


91 


92 EAT AND GROW THIN 
DEVILLED EGGS IN PIPKINS 


Scramble one or two eggs and while 
they are cooking stir in a little chut¬ 
ney which has been pounded smooth. 
Make very hot and serve in pipkins. 
This savory may be varied by flavor¬ 
ing with anchovy sauce. 


DEVILLED TONGUE 

Take some slices of cooked tongue, 
cut rather thick, and cut out into 
circles. Spread with mustard into 
which a little curry paste has been 
worked. Remove the skin from the 
trimmings of the tongue, mince them 
finely and pile the mince on to the 
circles. Make very hot and serve. 


RECIPES 


93 


HADDOCK IN PIPKINS 

Take some cooked Finnan Had¬ 
dock, remove all bones and skin and 
flake the fish finely. Add some very 
finely minced gherkin and pound to a 
paste, moistening with stock. Place 
in a pan with salt, pepper and cay¬ 
enne. Make the mixture very hot 
and serve it in pipkins. 


MAHDAH APPETIZER 

Cut some fairly thick squares of un¬ 
derdone cold roast beef and spread 
with French mustard and a little salt 
and grill lightly. Serve very hot scat¬ 
tered with finely grated horseradish. 


94 EAT AND GROW THIN 

MAHDAH MINCE 
Mince finely a mixture of meats such 
as veal, duck, chicken or game. The 
meat should be cut into tiny dice free 
from skin, bone and gristle. Flavor 
some clear gravy with curry powder 
and cook it well. Add a very little 
finely chopped gherkin and paprika. 
Make the meat hot in this gravy and 
serve in pipkins. 

MINCE OF MUSHROOMS 
Boil the mushrooms, setting aside 
some large ones on which to serve the 
Savory. Chop up the small ones with 
a few pickled walnuts, chives and 
celery. Pile the mixture on the large 
mushroom slices, and serve. 


RECIPES 


95 


OYSTER APPETIZER 

Chop up some uncooked oysters 
with minced celery, chives, salt, pep¬ 
per and a little tomato catsup. Serve 
on slices of raw tomatoes. 

OYSTER COCKTAIL 
One tablespoonful of tomato cat¬ 
sup, one dessertspoonful of Worces¬ 
tershire sauce, one teaspoonful of 
onion juice, one drop of Tabasco 
sauce, one teaspoonful of lemon juice. 
Mix well, pour over six raw oysters 
and serve in a glass. 

SALMON IN PIPKINS 
Take some cooked salmon, remove 
all bones and skin and flake the fish 
finely. Add some very finely minced 


96 EAT AND GROW THIN 

gherkin and pound to a paste, mois¬ 
tening with stock. Place in a pan 
with salt, pepper and cayenne. Make 
the mixture very hot and serve it in 
pipkins. 

SAVORY GRILL 
Cut some slices of underdone beef 
and trim them into long, finger shapes. 
Mince the trimmings and mix them 
with some minced cooked duck, or 
game, or chicken livers; season with 
mustard, celery salt, and a little grated 
lemon peel and chopped parsley, and 
moisten with gravy. Spread some 
mustard on the slices of beef, and, if 
liked, some chutney and then the 
mince. Roll up, tie into shape, grill, 
remove the ties and serve very hot. 


EGGS AND FISH 

CEUFS MOLLETS 
These are simply fresh eggs boiled 
until the white is sufficiently set to al¬ 
low them to be shelled, while the yolk 
is still semi-liquid. They are excel¬ 
lent served hot on a puree of green 
vegetables dressed with tomato sauce. 

MUSSELS (Mariniere) 

Wash the mussels in several waters, 
using a small knife and a brush that 
no particle of dirt may adhere to the 
shells. When they are perfectly clean 
put them in a large saucepan with a 
tumbler of cold water. Into this chop 

97 


98 EAT AND GROW THIN 

a young carrot, a sprig of parsley, and 
a large Spanish onion. Tie in a piece 
of muslin a bay leaf, a little thyme, 
and rub the sides of the saucepan with 
garlic. Salt and pepper (paprika is 
excellent). Cook over a hot fire until 
the mussels begin to open. Then lift 
them into a hot dish and continue 
cooking the juice until the carrot and 
onion are done. Then strain off the 
liquid through a cloth and pour over 
the mussels. The onion and chopped 
carrot may be left in the liquid if de¬ 
sired. The Mariniere will not be suc¬ 
cessful unless the mussels have been 
perfectly cleaned, as any grit that 
might adhere to them would settle into 
the sauce. When the desired weight 
has been reached and the diet has been 


RECIPES 


99 

relaxed, use a tumbler full of any dry 
white wine instead of the water and 
add a small piece of butter to the 
sauce. 


OYSTERS (Steamed) 

Scrub the unopened shells clean and 
place them in a colander over boiling 
water. Cover and steam until the 
shell opens and the oyster begins to 
curl. Remove and serve several oys¬ 
ters, hot, in the deep shell. Hand 
celery and sliced lemon. 


MEATS AND ENTRIES 

BARSCH (Duck, Polish Style) 

Cover a duck, well seasoned, with 
equal parts of cold water and beet- 
juice. Bring to a boil and skim. Add, 
one pound and a half of the round of 
beef, two large Spanish onions, two 
leeks, a bunch of celery, and half a 
dozen cloves. Cover and cook very 
slowly. When the meat is done strain 
off the bouillon, cool, remove all fat 
and clarify with the whites of eggs. 
Carve the duck as for serving, place 
the slices of beef cut thin round the 
outer edge of the dish, with alternate 

IOO 


RECIPES 


101 


rows of beets (which furnished the 
beet-water). Thicken the gravy with 
the beaten yolks of eggs by setting in 
a pan of hot water and stirring as for 
custard. To this sauce add some 
cooked mushrooms. Pour over the 
meat and serve. This sauce, made 
with' the yolk of eggs, should not be 
eaten until the diet has been relaxed, 
as eggs are only recommended in mod¬ 
eration, but for special occasions it 
may be indulged in. 

DOLMAS 

Take the tender leaves of a young 
cabbage, place three or four together 
and fill with the following mixture: 

Two pounds of raw mutton put 
through the mincing machine, two 


102 EAT AND GROW THIN 


large onions, one-half teacupful of 
chopped parsley, salt and paprika. 
Stir in three beaten eggs, form the 
mixture into oblong meat balls, roll 
and tie in thinly-buttered cabbage 
leaves. Place the Dolmas in a baking 
dish in layers with a plate to press 
them down and keep in place. Cover 
with stock and cook slowly for* one 
and a half hours. When done make a 
sauce of the juice with the yolks of 
eggs or simply pour the juice over the 
Dolmas. The Dolmas are very good 
served with tomato sauce. A tin of 
tomatoes, to which has been added a 
boiled onion, finely chopped, and a 
bay leaf for flavor, heated and sieved, 
makes an excellent and quickly pre¬ 
pared tomato sauce. 


RECIPES 


103 


ASPIC JELLY 

1^2 pints of water, half a gill of 
tarragon malt and chili vinegar (to¬ 
gether) , the juice of a lemon and also 
the rind, half a teaspoonful of salt, 1 
carrot, 1 turnip, 1 onion, 2 ozs. of 
gelatine, parsley, 10 peppercorns, the 
white and shell of one egg. 

Place all the ingredients in a sauce¬ 
pan and whisk over the fire until the 
mixture boils, then simmer for 20 min¬ 
utes. Strain, and when set it is ready 
for use. 

If not clear with one straining, 
strain once or twice through a jelly 
bag which has been rinsed in hot 
water, or through a fine, clean cloth 
wrung out in hot water. 


104 EAT AND GROW THIN 
MEAT JELLY 

An excellent savory jelly may be 
made from this recipe, omitting the 
vinegar and the lemon, and adding a 
spoonful or two of any meat extract. 
MAHDAH JELLIED PIE 
Have ready some nice pieces of lean 
meat (l lb.), hard-boiled egg, season¬ 
ing, grated lemon peel and chopped 
parsley. Arrange in a fireproof raised 
pie dish, and pour in a teacupful of 
stock. Cover and bake very gently for 
three hours. Leave until cold and re¬ 
move the grease with a teaspoon. Mix 
a dessertspoonful of meat extract, a 
teaspoonful of vinegar, salt, pepper 
and half an ounce of gelatine (use the 
powdered gelatine—it saves time and 
trouble) in half a pint of hot water. 
Pour it over and serve cold. 


VEGETABLES 


CHIVES 

may be bought growing of any green¬ 
grocer and if kept moist will last quite 
a long time. They are very nice 
chopped with French and runner 
beans. 

EGG-PLANT (Turkish Style) 
Wash and peel two good-sized egg¬ 
plants and chop. Put a pound of 
raw mutton through the mincing ma¬ 
chine. Season, using paprika. Add a 
chopped onion and a sprig of parsley. 
When the mixture is very fine, put it 
into a baking dish. Pour a rich to¬ 
mato sauce over and bake slowly. 

i°5 


io6 EAT AND GROW THIN 


GREEN VEGETABLES 
There are several kinds of greens 
that are excellent cooked as spinach, 
chopped fine, and if liked sieved and 
served either with pepper and salt or 
a little vinegar. These are the beet- 
tops, lettuce, Brussels sprouts, chic¬ 
ory and curly kale. 

STUFFED TOMATOES 
Choose six small tomatoes, all of a 
size. Cut a piece off the top of each 
and carefully remove the core and 
some of the inside. Drain the juice 
out of them and flavor with salt and 
pepper. Chop the remaining tomato 
and add to it six skinned and chopped 
mushrooms, a hint of grated nut¬ 
meg, half a teaspoonful of chopped 


RECIPES 


107 

parsley and a tablespoonful of boiled 
onion, finely chopped. Fill the to¬ 
mato cases with the mixture and bake 
for 10 minutes in a moderate oven. 
Serve very hot. This savory may be 
varied by making a mixture of the 
pulp of the tomato, whites of hard- 
boiled eggs, chopped celery, chives 
and the regular seasoning; the toma¬ 
toes when stuffed may be set in a meat 
jelly and when cold, served on crisp 
lettuce leaves, garnished with thin 
slices of cucumbers. 


SALADS AND SALAD 
DRESSINGS 


DIET DRESSING 

(Recipe for four people) 
teaspoonful dry English mustard. 
Dash of salt, paprika and cayenne 
(add more afterwards if desired). 
2 scant teaspoonfuls vinegar (diluted 
if strong). 

Two tablespoonfuls of soft mutton 
jelly (not large cooking spoons). 
Rub a bowl with garlic, mix the dry 
ingredients. Beat in the mutton jelly 
with a fork gradually as you would 
oil. Thin the mixture with the vine¬ 
gar. Parsley chopped very fine or 


RECIPES 


109 

growing chives may be sprinkled over 
the salad leaves. 

If after mixing you find the dress¬ 
ing too thick add a little water. The 
consistency will depend upon the 
thickness of the jelly. If the jelly is 
right the dressing will not be too thick. 
Set on ice. Use with all fruit salads; 
and as it contains no eggs you may in¬ 
dulge yourself every day if you like. 

If so desired just before serving, 
add a teaspoon (level) of tomato cat¬ 
sup, or chili sauce or almost any rel¬ 
ish which you will find will give va¬ 
riety and flavor to the dressing. But 
it is excellent eaten plain. 


no EAT AND GROW THIN 


MAHDAH MAYONNAISE 
(Salad Dressing) 

teaspoonful dry English mustard. 
Ys teaspoonful salt. 

34 teaspoonful paprika (Hungarian 
pepper). 

Dash of cayenne, if desired. 

Yokes of two and the white of one egg. 
One very scant half pint measure of 
soft mutton jelly. 

Two scant tablespoons vinegar; tarra¬ 
gon if desired; but if very strong 
the vinegar should be diluted. 

Mix the dry ingredients together, 
add the eggs, beating well with an 
egg-beater, yokes and whites at the 
same time. Then mix in the mutton 


RECIPES 


111 


jlelly gradually, beating constantly, 
about a teaspoonful at a time. Finally 
stir in the vinegar, first one table¬ 
spoonful and then the other, as one 
may be sufficient for your taste. I 
use two. One should always be spar¬ 
ing of vinegar in salads. Indeed a 
great deal depends upon individual 
taste in all seasoning. In. speaking 
of spoons I do not mean the large kit¬ 
chen spoon but the medium sized 
vegetable tablespoon and even so be 
sparing of the vinegar. Pour the mix¬ 
ture in a double boiler and cook like 
custard over a slow fire, stirring con¬ 
stantly until you get the consistency 
of rich cream. When cool, set in the 
ice-box for several hours. Before serv¬ 
ing beat up well with an egg-beater. 


112 EAT AND GROW THIN 


A teaspoonful of growing chives may 
be added or sprinkled over the salad 
leaves; or a teaspoonful of tomato cat¬ 
sup and I strongly recommend rubbing 
the salad bowl with a bit of garlic 
and say nothing about it. The gen¬ 
erality of people are very much preju¬ 
diced against garlic, but if they do 
not know it is garlic they will prob¬ 
ably compliment you on the flavor of 
your salad dressing. 

The substitution of mutton jelly 
for olive oil is a re-discovery of a 
very old English recipe and you will 
find it most satisfactory. It is not fat¬ 
tening and for bilious people (even 
those who are not trying to reduce) it 
is preferable to oil; and unless you 
tell your guests they will not remark 


RECIPES 


113 

the difference. I am taking it for 
granted that you succeed in making 
your dressing successfully. This 
mayonnaise may be kept on ice for a 
week or more. Should the weather 
be very warm and the ice run out it 
may separate; but it will thicken up 
again as soon as it is thoroughly 
chilled. It always requires beating 
before serving. If you like to make 
it in advance, you can pour it hot into 
a sterilized jar, seal like preserves and 
keep it a long time in a cool dry place, 
always, however, setting it on the ice 
a few hours before using. It is also 
very economical, as you can use the 
mutton from which the jelly has been 
made to make mutton hash (excellent 
with tomato sauce), or the meat may 


H 4 EAT AND GROW THIN 

be sliced and served with the mayon¬ 
naise itself with lettuce. 

The above recipe will make suf¬ 
ficient for four persons. If you double 
it for eight, do not double the dry sea¬ 
soning, or the vinegar. Season to 
taste. Try it. 

MUTTON JELLY 

The mutton jelly required for the 
Mahdah mayonnaise as well as the 
diet dressing, can be made from the 
recipe of any good cook-book; but do 
not boil either onions or herbs with it. 
Just a little salt. It must be a clear, 
well-strained, pure mutton jelly, soft 
rather than stiff. When turned from 
the bowl (after you have removed the 
fat) it should quiver and readily 


RECIPES 


115 

break into soft morsels. A pound and 
a half will make sufficient for a fam¬ 
ily of five or six persons. 

For all fruit salads use the diet 
dressing in preference to the mayon¬ 
naise. For coleslaw the mayonnaise 
is best and for meat and vegetable 
salads. But this dressing must not be 
indulged in during the first month of 
diet on account of the eggs; then it 
may be eaten once a week. After three 
months, or when you have reduced to 
the required weight, you may use it 
oftener. If you are like the lady who 
has written me that the menus have 
made her too thin, and she can’t 
stop losing weight try as she may, 
you may eat it every day. Otherwise 
not. 


n6 EAT AND GROW THIN 


ARTICHOKE (Diet Dressing) 

Boil the artichokes until tender and 
serve with the diet dressing, which is 
in reality a sauce vinaigrette. 

CABBAGE AND CELERY 
SALAD 

Rub a salad bowl with garlic or on¬ 
ion. Chop up the tender, white part 
of a small, white raw cabbage with a 
few stalks of celery. Season with salt 
and pepper. When the salad dressing 
is quite cold, beat it up well, and mix 
thoroughly through the cabbage. The 
dish may be garnished with alternate 
slices of hard-boiled eggs and boiled 
beets. 

After the dressing is mixed with the 
cabbage serve at once. 


RECIPES 


117 


FISH SALAD 

An excellent fish salad is made of 
any kind of cold left-over white fish, 
with or -without shrimps or prawns, 
with sliced or quartered hard-boiled 
eggs, a teaspoonful of lemon juice and 
about half a cucumber sliced. Either 
the diet or the boiled dressing may be 
used. 

HARLEQUIN SALAD 

One cup each of red and white cab¬ 
bage. 

One cup of cooked French beans. 

One half cup of boiled beets. 

One chopped onion (boiled). 

One half cup of carrots (cooked). 

Salt and paprika. 

The vegetables may be cooked to- 


n8 EAT AND GROW THIN 


gether, cut into dice, and served with 
the diet dressing. Of course young 
spring vegetables are preferable. 

HASHED LAMB SALAD 
Hashed lamb of mutton left over 
makes an excellent salad combined 
with a cupful of finely chopped cooked 
French beans, a few sprigs of mint and 
the diet dressing. 

FRESH PINEAPPLE SALAD 
Slice fresh pineapple, place on crisp 
lettuce leaves and pour the diet dress¬ 
ing over, omitting the chili sauce. 

Do not use canned pineapple as it 
is sweetened with sugar. Only fresh 
fruit must be eaten. 


RECIPES 


119 


RUSSIAN SALAD 
Chop any kind of cold cooked meat 
(chicken is best). To this add cold 
boiled carrots, French beans, beets, 
onions or any favorite vegetable. Mix 
two hard-boiled eggs and a little cel¬ 
ery chopped very fine in the diet dress¬ 
ing and serve cold. 

SOURKRAUT SALAD 
consists of the diet dressing poured 
over a good dish of sourkraut. 

SORREL AND LETTUCE 
combined makes a tasty salad, likewise 
the endive, the field dandelion, celery 
and chicory. Sprinkle the leaves with 
the finely chopped chives and rub the 
salad bowl with the garlic or with an 


onion. 


DESSERTS 

APPLE MOULD 
l lb. of apples, the rind of one 
lemon, ^4 oz. of gelatine, half a pint 
of water, half a grain of saccharine 
(sour apples may require from three- 
quarters to one grain), cochineal or 
carmine. 

LEMON JELLY 

134 pints of water, i}4 gills of 
lemon juice, half an inch of cinnamon, 
4 cloves, 1 oz. of gelatine, the rind of 
2 lemons, the whites of 2 eggs, 1 grain 
of saccharine. 

Peel the lemon rind very thinly and 
120 


RECIPES 


121 


put it into a clean, bright saucepan, 
with the water, cinnamon, cloves, 
strained lemon juice, the washed and 
crushed egg shells, and gelatine. Dis¬ 
solve the saccharine in a little of the 
water and add, together with the 
slightly whipped whites of the eggs. 
Whisk all over gentle heat until just 
on boiling point, remove the whisk 
and let it boil up to the top of the pan, 
then draw the pan to the side of the 
fire and leave it until the scum cracks. 
Place a basin under a jelly bag, or un¬ 
der a clean tea cloth tied on to the 
legs of a chair inverted on another 
chair. Pour boiling water through the 
cloth into the basin, empty it, then 
pour the jelly through the cloth very 
gently. If cloudy, strain the jelly 


122 EAT AND GROW THIN 


through the cloth two or three times, 
but a jelly made with saccharine is 
rarely as clear as one made with sugar, 
as the sugar helps to clear it. Put it 
into a mould rinsed out in cold water 
and leave in a cold place to set. 

It is well to ask the chemist, when 
buying saccharine, how many tablets 
make one grain. Messrs. Boots 5 full 
strength tablets contain one-third of 
a grain, so three tablets of this 
strength are required for this jelly. 
If preferred sweeter, another tablet 
may be used, but if too much saccha¬ 
rine is used for sweetening, it imparts 
an unpleasant flavor to the dish. 


RECIPES 


123 


LEMON SPONGE 

2 lemons, oz. of gelatine, 2 
whites of egg, 1 grain of saccharine, 
half a pint of water. 

Peel the lemon very thinly, and 
put the rind into a pan with the water 
and gelatine. Stir over gentle heat 
until the gelatine is melted, then leave 
the pan in a warm place for five min¬ 
utes. Dissolve the saccharine in a 
little of the water and add to the rest, 
with the lemon juice. Strain, and let 
the mixture become nearly cold, then 
add the whipped whites of eggs and 
whisk until spongy and nearly set¬ 
ting. Put into a wetted mould and 
turn out when set. If liked, this may 
be whisked until rocky and then piled 
on a glass dish. 


124 EAT AND GROW THIN 
SOUFFLES 

are made by cooking the fruits and 
sweetening with a tiny part of a grain 
of saccharine (you will find one third 
of a grain go a long way, but this is a 
matter of taste), and then pressing the 
fruit pulp through a cullender or 
sieve. When you have a smooth 
puree, set it away to cool and just be¬ 
fore serving, whip in the white of an 
egg or two (according to the amount 
of puree) and beat it in the puree. 


STATISTICS 



THE REASON WHY 

T HE Mahdah menus are based on 
the dietary charts issued by the 
United States department of Agricul¬ 
ture (office of Experimental Stations, 
Mr. A. C. True, director) and pre¬ 
pared by Mr. C. F. Langworthy, 
expert in charge of Nutrition Investi¬ 
gations. They furnish the latest and 
completest statement of food-constitu¬ 
ents. 

It is evident that a thinning diet 
should eliminate—in so far as is con¬ 
sistent with general health—both the 
fats which are stored in the body as 
fats and the carbohydrates which in 
the body are transformed into fats. 
This is what has been done in the 


127 


128 EAT AND GROW THIN 


menus in this book. Although the 
amount of fats and carbohydrates 
which enter the dishes given for each 
day is slight, a sufficiency has been ad¬ 
mitted to insure the necessary heat- 
yielding fuels. 

Here is a list of the foods which 
MUST NOT be eaten and the reason 
why. 

A slight study of the proportions of 
fat and carbohydrates they contain 
will make perfectly clear the reason 
why they are excluded from a diet 
which is meant to destroy fat. It will 
be seen that, in certain instances, fruits 
and nuts are as diligent fat-producers 
as bacon or flour. 

The figures given in the following 
list are quoted from Mr. C. F. Lang- 
worthy’s valuable compilation. 


FORBIDDEN FOOD AND WHY 


Because it con tains percentage of 


You must 


Carbo¬ 

not eat 

Fats 

hydrates 

Milk. 

.. 4 

5 

Cream. 

... 18.5 

4-5 

Cheese ... 

... 18.5 

2.4 

Pork. 

...30 


Ham . 

... 38.8 


Olive oil. 

...100 


Bacon. 

...67 


Lard. 

... 100 


Maize. 

... 4.3 

73-4 

Wheat. 

... 2.2 

73-7 

Buckwheat .... 

... 2.2 

73 

Rice. 

... 2 

77 

Oats. 

• •• 3 

69.2 

White bread . .. 

... 1.3 

53 


129 
















130 EAT AND GROW THIN 


Because it contains percentage of 


You must 


Carbo¬ 

not eat 

Fats 

hydrates 

Macaroni . 

i -5 

15.8 

Sugar . 


100 

Stick candy. 


96 

Potato.. 

0.1 

18.4 

Green corn. 

i.i 

19.7 

Figs .. 


74 

Banana ... . 


22 

Grapes. 

Unfermented Grape 

i.6 

19 

Juice. 


20.3 

The chestnut. 

7.0 

74.2 

The walnut. 

634 

16.1 

Raisins. 

3-3 

76.1 


All these dangerous fat-making 
foods have been excluded from the 
menus; but there remain innumerable 
dishes at once satisfying and fascinat¬ 
ing. 














What This Book 


Claims— 


That excessive fat is a disease. 

That there is a cure for it, certain 
and not unpleasant. 

That not only may the flesh be 
reduced, but the healthy tissue 
built up, and the whole body 
strengthened. 

That this may be effected without 
drugs, by eating the right kind of 
food, rightly prepared. 

In other words—that, by using the 
Mahdah menus, it is possible to 

Eat and Grow Thin 




What a Prominent 
Actress says: 


In an interview with Miss Marie 
Cahill in the Evening Mail , Zoe 

Beckley quotes her as saying: 

“I found a wonderful book called 
‘Eat and Grow Thin.’ Why, it’s a 
regular young Bible! You don’t starve 
yourself; you just cut out certain 
sugars and starches. It melted me 
down from—let’s see, how much did 
I weigh—mmm—hum—er—well, from 
what I was six months ago to what I 
am now! 

“I’ve looked myself up in the weight- 
tables and when I get off three pounds 
more I shall be—just—scientifically— 
correct! 

“It can be done, though, like every¬ 
thing else, if you’ve got will power 
enough to keep at it.” 




13 2 




IF"hat the Press Says About 

Eat and Grow Thin 

THE NATION 

“Altogether an admirable little book.” 

GOOD HEALTH MAGAZINE 

“Vance Thompson contributes an in¬ 
troduction to the present volume that 
will be read with delight by all thin 
men and consternation by fat ones.” 

PITTSBURGH POST 

“It is a pleasure to recommend such a 
sensible treatment of a subject which 
is generally written about by cranks.” 

THE DETROIT FREE PRESS 

“Buy the book.” 

THE WORLD 

“No disguised starvation follows. We 
read in the menus delicious sug¬ 
gestions.” 

BOSTON HERALD 

“A boon to fat people.” 

THE EVENING POST 

“Shows how anyone may without 
starving or sacrificing table joys win 
back the winsome waist of youth.” 


133 


Meatless Cookery 

By Maria Mcllvaine Gillmore 

Introduction by 

Louis Faugeres Bishop, M. D. 

Professor of Heart and Circulatory Diseases 
Fordham University School of Medicine 

With Charts, Diagrams, etc. 


Mrs. Gillmore’s book provides an 
attractive assortment of recipes, all 
of which meet within the restrictions 
of a very rigid diet the needs of those 
suffering from auto-intoxication, or 
threatened with serious disorders of 
the heart and blood vessels, and at 
the same time satisfy the palate. 

Dr. Bishop, after years of heart 
study, is convinced that the foods 
which do damage are usually found 
in the group including eggs, iish, or 
meat, but only experiment can de¬ 
termine which is the cause of irrita¬ 
tion, since “one man’s meat is an¬ 
other man’s poison”; all must be 
eliminated for a time until there is 
improvement. Then, if desired, one 
article at a time may be restored un¬ 
til the cause of irritation is fixed. 


J 




Are you on diet? 



Has the doctor or¬ 
dered you to stop 
eating meat ? 



Try 

A Meatless Carte du Jour 


Grapefruit Cocktail 


Almond Soup Chestnut Soup Cream of Asparagus 

Spaghetti Croquettes Brazil Nut Cutlets 

Cheese Omelet Roman Gnocchi Rice and Nut Rissoles 

Chestnut Pie Scalloped Mushrooms Irish Stew 

Lentil and Potato Loaf Vegetable Oysters 

Banana and Walnut Salad Cheese Straws 

Salted Almonds 

Fig and Indian Pudding 
Old Fashioned Cranberry Dumplings 

Orange Water Ice Pineapple Frapp6 


Almond Wafers Angel Food 


Cereal Coffee 


Recipes for all these in “Meatless Cookery” 


135 























































































































































































































































































































































































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